Soldon Manor

Soldon Manor

This manor house was built in the mid-16th century and extended in the mid-17th century, with some alterations made in the early 18th century. The hall was shortened and the front walls were raised and partly rebuilt in the early to mid-19th century. The south end was gutted and the roof partly rebuilt in the mid-20th century.

The building is constructed of random rubble local stone with granite dressings and quoins to the rebuilt north gable end. It features relieving arches to window openings in the west wing, slate roofs, and stone stacks at various points; the south gable end has a 20th-century brick stack, and there is a rendered stack on the west gable end of the wing.

The plan is T-shaped, with a truncated ceiled hall incorporating a through passage. To the left is a staircase and panelled room that were inserted later. The end bay to the south has been gutted and opens to a partly reconstructed roof space. The west wing abuts the central panelled room, with a corridor in a later outshot on its north and west sides.

The east front is two storeys with an irregular five-bay facade. A two-storey gabled porch projects from the second bay on the right, featuring a two-light stone chamfered mullioned window under a squarehood mould. Below this window is a coat of arms, probably 19th-century, bearing the initials N(icholas) P(rideaux) and the date 1649, with a depressed pointed arch opening. The inner doorway has a depressed Tudor arch head with a moulded wooden doorframe decorated with spandrels and a 19th-century framed and panelled door. To the right is a small leaded two-light casement above a three-light stone mullioned hall window with hoodmould, with slightly splayed wall below. To the left of the porch are two two-light 20th-century wooden casements under wooden lintels set below the eaves, and a three-light gabled stone mullioned window under hoodmould beside the porch. The ground floor has three three-light stone mullioned windows without hoodmoulds. A 20th-century random rubble garage abuts the north gable end, which bears a datestone of 1646.

The south front of the west wing is one and a half storeys with three bays, all featuring three-light chamfered stone mullions under hoodmoulds except the ground floor right, which is four-light. An entrance via a gable porch is at the centre, with the hoodmould of a window reset as a lintel. The end bay on the left shows offsets of a lean-to addition.

The interior contains exposed joists to the ceiling in the hall, with good moulded jambs to the fireplace against the rear wall and a straight stone lintel. A bolt socket in the wall marks the position of the front door, and a moulded doorframe leads to the rear doorway. Part of a beam with sockets for joists, possibly from a screens passage, has been reset in a cupboard to the left of the entrance. A narrow staircase rises against the rear wall opposite, predating the panelling in the adjoining room. This panelled room contains an unusual wooden chimneypiece with a depressed four-centred arch head and blind niches on either side, with modern grate. The room has 19th-century panelling in 16th-century style, possibly incorporating some earlier work. The end room is open to the roof space and has a 16th-century fireplace with a chamfered wooden lintel at first-floor level and three cruck-type trusses with wind braces, created in the 20th century. The first floor features a good early 18th-century bolection-moulded surround to a chimneypiece in the bedroom above the panelled room. The room above the hall is set at a higher level with five pairs of collar beam trusses, reinforced with extra collars; the purlins have been removed. The roof space to the central eight bays was not inspected, but is said to be a principal rafter roof.

Later alterations make it difficult to determine the date of the original structure and whether it was ever an open hall house. A drawing of the house made in 1716 by Edmund Prideaux shows an upper storey to the hall which continued one bay north with a crosswing abutting; there was another bay and outbuildings beyond.